Next weeks Prompt: Write a story that opens with your main character doing something that is completely antithetical to his or her personality. Let the story be about how this character came to do what he or she did.
Roles for next week:
Prompt Discussion: Antithesis
Teachable: Domo Panda with Blog Design
Prompt Bringer: (Shoot, I don't remember! this is why I should write this down!)
QuoteMaster: Alex Turner (I'll experiment with this, it's fun but I don't know that we need to complicate this any more... :P )
Prompt Discussion: Talked about our description pieces, mostly focused on tone & diction. Lots of excellent writing, but not necessarily potential for standalone stories (except for Jn, whose book hijacked her brain while she was writing.) A good opportunity to stretch ourselves into territory we're not comfortable with.
Teachable: Speed writing Fantasy Critters
Marine Cat-spiders, flowy death dragons, and Clifford the big black luck-puppy.
3/4/13 Meeting Recap
Write Prompt for next week:
Kaylee immediately captures the audiences heart as the cute, plucky ships mechanic by being cheerful, and saying quirky things (Everything's Shiny, cap!)
Write for twenty minutes, without stopping, a piece of pure description about something you see (a person, a scene, or an object in the room). No dialogue, no metaphor, no emotion; just pure description, as detailed as possible. Then write, nonstop, for another twenty minutes about the same subject, but this time use only speculation—imagine the subject's thoughts, perceptions, emotions, inner, or outward dialogue, etc.—and/or your own thoughts and observations about the subject. Combine the two pieces, and see what kind of story comes to life.
Discussion From Last Weeks Prompt:
We read everyone's perspective pieces, and surprisingly enough, nobody stepped on anyone's toes! It was very interesting to imagine the characters interacting with one another, (and at times they nearly did, and it worked!)
Teachable from this week:
We read a passage from Lord of the Rings quoting Faramir and started a discussion about:
Introducing a Character and Getting an immediate reader connection:
We started with what Tolkien does well:
- Faramir values peace and beauty (both intrinsically valuable) in a world that values glory
- Faramir is fair, and just, and patient, and humble. And he makes that clear using trigger words and phrases, and is put to the test early and often during his brief stint in the book
- Faramir has a well developed foil (character to contrast against) in his Brother Borimir, who is a prime example of everything Gondor values (Glory in Battle, Strength, Rash Bravery)
This makes him very likable and makes his character valuable to the reader, and as a target for consequences. It sounds cruel, but we need to have characters that readers like so we can feel the weight of consequences when they suffer. And if it's in the beginning of our stories or near the end, we have to introduce them very quickly.
Then we started discussing the case of wanting to make a character un-likable (much harder to do).
- Making them Cruel or obnoxious is one way.
- Cowardice, unless it's funny, is a sure winner. Brave villans are admirable (Javert), cowardly ones are detestable (Commodus in Gladiator)
- Have them attack a likable character
- Have them ridicule a relate-able flaw in another character. (Snapping at someone for being reasonably late to a meeting)
You can hinge your whole narrative around a character in the beginning, and set the stage for who to like and who not to, and who is good and bad:
A Well presented case study: The Pilot Episode of Firefly
Kaylee immediately captures the audiences heart as the cute, plucky ships mechanic by being cheerful, and saying quirky things (Everything's Shiny, cap!)
-You like Book because he is convinced to go with Serenity by Kaylee's love of her baby (the ship that is)
-You learn to dislike Jayne because he insults her.
-You learn to like Mal because he defends her from Jayne
-The stakes are raised when she (as an innocent bystander) is shot by the Fed agent, obviously he is super Bad dude.
-You learn to like Jayne a little more because underneath that mean, crusty mercenary exterior is a extremely competent, brutal mercenary, and underneath that is a big softie that really cares about Kaylee's well being.
- And so on!
2/25/13 Meeting recap
Next weeks prompt: Write a scene that connects back to This One from the perspective of another character. You're not limited to the time that piece covers, but be sure to link back to it. A few direct quotes will probably help.
2/19/13 Meeting Recap
Next Week's Prompt: Dialogue Prompt recycle!
Teachable on the Prompt:
It's been a few months, we've got some new faces, and as we heard from Jn, this is a really valuable skill for anyone who wants to get a lot of ideas down on paper fast (Nanowrimo style.) You should check out the original post that talks about what we learned last time we did this.
We've focused a lot on constraints that force us to be hyper-creative with our diction these last few weeks, which is an excellent skill to develop. However, I wanted to get us back into thinking about characters & story telling for a while. This prompt in particular allows scenes to write themselves. All you're allowed to think about is "what will they say next" which leads to the setting, characters, plot and action all getting distilled down to only the stuff that's worth having your characters talk about it. Using these kinds of tools can limit Tolkein-esqu exposition (beautiful when done correctly, boring if done wrong) and grab your readers with the details that they care about because your characters care about them.
Also for your enlightenment and entertainment, I present to you: They're Made of Meat - Terry Bisson
Teachable on the Prompt:
It's been a few months, we've got some new faces, and as we heard from Jn, this is a really valuable skill for anyone who wants to get a lot of ideas down on paper fast (Nanowrimo style.) You should check out the original post that talks about what we learned last time we did this.
We've focused a lot on constraints that force us to be hyper-creative with our diction these last few weeks, which is an excellent skill to develop. However, I wanted to get us back into thinking about characters & story telling for a while. This prompt in particular allows scenes to write themselves. All you're allowed to think about is "what will they say next" which leads to the setting, characters, plot and action all getting distilled down to only the stuff that's worth having your characters talk about it. Using these kinds of tools can limit Tolkein-esqu exposition (beautiful when done correctly, boring if done wrong) and grab your readers with the details that they care about because your characters care about them.
Also for your enlightenment and entertainment, I present to you: They're Made of Meat - Terry Bisson
02/04/13 Meeting Recap
Next weeks Prompt: Write a new piece or re-write one of your old pieces as a lipogram or using some other type of highly restricted writing (see below for details).
Challenge Mode: Write using prisoners case- no letters with ascenders or descenders.
Prompt from last week: Found Names Character Sketch
Our assignment was to find a name, fictional or otherwise, and use it to create a short character sketch. The personality and traits of our character would develop solely from the name itself, and the context in which we found it. We ended up using names we found in homework articles, old books, graffiti, broken signs, and other mediums. The characters that came out of these 'found names' were varied, and most even seemed to take on some characteristics quite different from their own authors.
Teachable moment brought to you by Jenn! Restricted Writing!
Challenge Mode: Write using prisoners case- no letters with ascenders or descenders.
Prompt from last week: Found Names Character Sketch
Our assignment was to find a name, fictional or otherwise, and use it to create a short character sketch. The personality and traits of our character would develop solely from the name itself, and the context in which we found it. We ended up using names we found in homework articles, old books, graffiti, broken signs, and other mediums. The characters that came out of these 'found names' were varied, and most even seemed to take on some characteristics quite different from their own authors.
Teachable moment brought to you by Jenn! Restricted Writing!
This is one of Jenn's favorite techniques when she gets into a writing rut. To put it simply, restricted writing is any writing done to conform to a set of rules. A sonnet or a haiku would count as would acrostic poetry. We discussed lipograms in more specific detail. Lipograms are written by choosing to not use words that contain one or more specific letters. Jenn wrote her character sketch in this form as an example. We also discussed and read a few passages from George Perec's book A Void which dances around the letter E but never uses it. It is rarely possible to simply substitute words for synonyms when attempting a lipogram. This forces the writer to use different words and modify sentence structure as well.
1/28/13 Write Club Reboot!
Next weeks Prompt: Character Sketch inspired by a found name. (Cemeteries, or movie credits, or broken bowling alley signs... for example)
Challenge mode: make it fit your setting?
Prompt from last week: Write a setting 250-500 words
We went over our assignments, and discussed the narrative tools we used to make our settings more than just word pictures.
-Use emotional reactions to the setting to tell the reader what is being felt
-Use senses other than sight (definitely do this!)
-Present the reader with cues that may powerfully trigger other memories (either in line with your scene or to jarringly contrast with it)
-Use analogies (metaphors & similes) to give life to descriptions.
Simile: ...groaned underfoot, as though it had just been awoken.
Metaphor: ...groaned, just awoken as it passed underfoot.
A little futher: ...now sleepily groaning under the foot of man.
Metaphor, as a rule is much more active, and gives more life to the thing (gravel in this case) that you are comparing. In my actual text I chose to go beyond metaphor to anthropomorphize (attribute human qualities to) the gravel. Simile allows for comparisons of much more dissimilar things without being confusing. Consider this old saw:
Simile: That idea went over like a lead balloon
Metaphore: That idea was a lead balloon.
Teachable moment brought to you by Jenn!
We discussed using a three act structure (largely from script writing and theory) in conjunction with non-linear plot lines. The original blog post from which Jenn found the idea is here. The script writing and 3 part story structure tools came from Save the Cat! The most important concepts are that all stories can be broken into a beginning, middle and end. Call it introduction, rising action and conclusion or whatever technical terms you like but this is always the basic pattern to a tale (even non-fiction). Most stories play out with increasing tension towards a resolution but sometimes this can be best accomplished best by describing the pieces out of order. This is often the case when the author wants to convey not how something happened but WHY. Non-linear timelines work well for situations like time-travel (shocking, I know), memory, or multiple characters experiencing the same events in parallel. A few of the non-linear examples that came up included The Things They Carried, Momento, Run Lola Run, Dracula, Slaughterhouse 5, Catch 22 and Cloud Atlas. There were also a few web comics mentioned (with names I don't remember). We also read "The Continuity of Parks" by Julio Cortazar.
Meeting Recap 10/25/12
Meeting Recap:
Then, to test the colaborative, creative wiles of our group, we wrote up a little line-by-line short story about a dark and stormy night. Fun stuff!
(The Discussion, with the story at the bottom of it, are posted in the Editor's office)
NANOWRIMO!
All that being said We're looking forward to our Writing Goals for NANOWRIMO! (National Novel Writing Month for the unitiated.)
November is a month of many things... Facial Hair, Pomegranates, Native American Awareness, and Writing our brains out. The "traditional" rules are as follows:
***Write 50000 words (1667 words/day) before Midnight November 30th.***
With that lofty (but atainable) goal in mind Let's set some Goals for ourselves:
Alexander J. Turner: I plan to double the current word count (End with 10,000 words) of "More Letters" and bonus points if I can come up with a decent conclusion.
Jn: Jn's going for the full monty! 50,000 words by 23:59:59 on November 30th, 2012. Godspeed!
More to come... Email Alex your personal Goals!
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